e and what was false in his story. However, the fact
remained that strange things did happen there, and the King of
Sweden, to whom this part of the country belonged, more than once
gave orders to cut down the haunted wood, but there was no one
with courage enough to obey his commands. At length one man,
bolder than the rest, struck his axe into a tree, but his blow
was followed by a stream of blood and shrieks as of a human
creature in pain. The terrified woodcutter fled as fast as his
legs would carry him, and after that neither orders nor threats
would drive anybody to the enchanted moor.

A few miles from the Tontlawald was a large village, where dwelt
a peasant who had recently married a young wife. As not
uncommonly happens in such cases, she turned the whole house
upside down, and the two quarrelled and fought all day long.

By his first wife the peasant had a daughter called Elsa, a good
quiet girl, who only wanted to live in peace, but this her
stepmother would not allow. She beat and cuff